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Will Comcast’s XFINITY produce an Affinity with Customers?

With some 1900 company name changes last year, one would think these re-branding efforts would pay dividends in market share, customer perception, and employee focus in forging a new direction, both in the short and long term. Does XFINIITY, See (Comcast launches XFINITY), make relevant and pertinent business sense for all stakeholders involved, or can it be viewed as confusing and irrelevant?

These are the questions Comcast (Nasdaq: CMCSA, CMCSK) must answer when making the investment in retraining customers to think in terms of their existing and new products under new brand name. But there are inherent issues with re-branding which must be addressed to ensure the new name fits with an existing and future targeted customer culture.

These are the issues Comcast probably considered when changing its product brand name to XFINITY. If you take the meaning of the word (affinity), pronounced and spelled similar to XFINITY, the meaning produces associations like:

How does an Affinity connection relate?

(A feeling of connection) – “a natural liking for or identification with somebody or something”

The question remains, will customers have a connection with the XFINITY name? Is Comcast seeking to merge its products, both existing and new, into a new brand that best describes its future? What else will the company do to enhance the name, such as tying it to new and improved customer service and quality engineering? Or maybe it wants to distance its products from an old brand name like Comcast, which has been through the ups and downs of customer perceptions.

Although the company parent name will remain Comcast, even with the newly acquired NBC-Universal, all of its products will be marketed under the name XFINITY, including, Digital Video, Broadband, and Telephone. This goes on to include employee uniforms, customer bills, and product related advertising.

Len Grace is a technology industry veteran with over 18 years experience with Comcast Corporation. His insights into pertinent and relevant issues within the Broadband/Telecom/Cable/Wireless and Mobile sectors both inform and enlighten readers on current industry trends, analysis, business strategy, competitive landscape and legislative agendas.
Len is the founder & editor of The Cable Pipeline, a technology blog who contributes to various technology websites including Light Reading, BroadbandBreakfast.com (Expert Opinion), SiliconAngle, Cisco Community: Service Provider Mobility, Amdocs: InTouch Community Portal, Bloomberg's bx Business Exchange, CircleID, and Sys-Con Media/Utilizer. Also see his reporting.